Very well, I'm willing to admit that I was working from erronous sources...

But that still doesn't change the accuracy of your statement that GKs are FASTER than Generals, because they have the SAME SPD cap.

And I feel so ganged up on x(

Well, I'd have expected more people to support what's supposedly the official promotions. Sorry.

Anyway, Great Knights have the same promotion gains in Speed as Generals and have one more Constitution.

No, Amelia has 11 CON as General and 10 CON as Great Knight...using Angelsword, the site that you're supposedly using.

Ouch. Chalk up another screwup for me. >_>

OK, you win the Speed bit. Cavalier Amelia is still MUCH easier to train compared to Knight Amelia, though.

quote TemplarSimon

OK, you win the Speed bit. Cavalier Amelia is still MUCH easier to train compared to Knight Amelia, though.

would you prefer easy training or higher/equal stats in everything?

Considering how immensely underlevelled Amelia is, ease of training, especially given that her stats are strong enough as a Great Knight.

She has 1 higher POW, SKL, SPD, and RES as General. I'd say that plus Great Shield is worth it.

Great Shield has an abysmal chance of activating; at endgame level it's a 10% chance. Not happening. The other stats marginally affect her performance and are thus worth sacrificing for the 3 extra Move from first promotion to second and the one higher Move after second promotion.

i always take the easy training... since when has one stat each make such a big difference anyways?

quote TemplarSimon

Great Shield has an abysmal chance of activating; at endgame level it's a 10% chance. Not happening. The other stats marginally affect her performance and are thus worth sacrificing for the 3 extra Move from first promotion to second and the one higher Move after second promotion.

Better stats AND better caps are worth sacrificing a few useless move points.

Besides, she's better in arena as General than as GK too...

Training is absolutely NO concern in this game, so that shouldn't influence your decision at all...

You mean using the Tower to train Amelia? Well, there are a few ways you can do that:

1. Only train her to LvL 10 Recruit, and then return to the campaign, in which case the Tower has no effect on her promotion.

2. Train her to the same LvL as everyone else and then return to the campaign, in which case about half of the unpromoted Levels are still left and her 2nd class is still relevant.

3. Train her to LvL 20 Knight or Cavalier, in which case only her 3rd class is relevant. By doing this, though, you are essentially abusing her, and you need to give a better reason for doing so than "so I can prove that General is a better class for Amelia."

Now, let us assume that you're doing #1 or #2(or better yet, not using the Tower at all). In this case, her 2nd class(Cavalier or Knight) is going to see use during the campaign. Cavalier is undeniably superior to Knight; 3 more Move, more Aid and an additional Weapon Type.

I'll agree with you that General > Great Knight. The gap between General and GK, though, is almost nonexistant compared to the gap between Cavalier and Knight. To start, your statement that the General has one more Spd is erroneous. It has one more Con, not one more Spd; there *is* a difference.

Next, the issue of stat caps. Stat caps are irrelevant here; the only stats Amelia caps on average are Spd and Luck, and both of those caps are the same for both classes.

Second, the General's advantages over GK vs the Cavalier's advantages over Knight. The General's defensive advantage is 1 Res and Great Shield.

Res is the weakest defensive stat. Why? Roughly 8% of the game's enemies are Magicians; in other words, less than one in ten. When only 1 of every 10 enemies uses Magic, and the other 9 are using physical weapons, physical defense will actually come into play far more often and is thus more significant. The Cavalier, now, boasts +30 Dodge against enemy Axemen compared to the Knight(the Knight is forced to have WTD against Axes, or -15 Dodge; the Cavalier can achieve WTA, or +15).

The point? 30 Dodge crushes 1 Res. Now, the 30 Dodge only applies against enemy Axemen. But guess what is even less common than enemy Axemen? Enemy Magicians.

Now, on to Great Shield. Great Shield is an undeniable advantage; compared to Swords on the Cavalier, though, it is a barely visible one. At best, Great Shield has about 8% activation rate, and that's not a percentage you ever want to be counting on to save your unit(92% is an intolerably high rate of failure). If Amelia is in a situation where she's having to rely on that percentage to stay alive, you should have never put her there to begin with. In the face of these facts, Great Shield has no practical application and almost 0 significance; on the other hand, you can rely on the Cavalier's 30 Dodge to apply against enemy Axemen and protect it from said enemies.

The General's other advantages are 1 Skl and 1 Str. As they give +30 Dodge against enemy Axes, Swords also grant +30 Hit against them, and this easily defeats the meager 2 Hit granted by a point of Skl. It also defeats a point of Str easily enough; but if that isn't enough, I'd bring up that the Great Knight has a higher Sword Rank, thanks to being able to raise Sword Rank as a Cavalier. Thus, it can use the Steel Sword right off the bat against enemy Axes, while the General's stuck with the weaker Iron Sword for a while.

And we return to the one point of Con the General has. Well, while Cavalier(F) -> Great Knight(F) and Knight(F) -> General(F) both grant +2 Spd, Recruit -> Cavalier(F) grants +2 Spd while Recruit -> Knight(F) grants only +1. So, in practice, the GK averages one point higher Spd than the General. One Spd > one Con.

This message was edited by WJC on Sep 26 2006.

I'll grant that Amelia is more fun to train as a cavalier than as a knight because of the movement and swords. Plus, her battle sprite is cuter and you avoid the sillyness of that huge pink armor.

However, I've trained Amelia many times and i can tell you she CAN max out strenght, skill and even defense as a general. Her growth rates are 40/40/30 respectively, so she can do it with the 47 level ups and 2 class changes that she gets. The class changes to knight and general both give her more strenght and defense, the two stats where she needs the most help.

Paladin : She will be your best paladin, but the caps don't do justice to her potential.

Great Knight : OK, but that makes her vulnerable to both armor-piercing and horse-killing weapons, the stat caps and promotion gains aren't as interesting as for a general, and the GK animation sucks... even the criticals.

General : Best caps, all melee weapons, best constitution, best promotion gains and a skill. For the record, the great shield skill activates 20% of the time for a level 20 general (equal to the unit's level). It seems much lower for Amelia because she dodges very often.

Super Recruit : Fun choice, but go for it only if you got seriously screwed in str and def and got great sp and sk as a recruit, cuz you'll get swordmaster stat caps (+1 in str). Body ring(s) required.

*is failing his reading homework*

could someone give me a quick review of peoples opinions and others counter opinions? cut details down as much as possible...

quote SuperFrog

I'll grant that Amelia is more fun to train as a cavalier than as a knight because of the movement and swords. Plus, her battle sprite is cuter and you avoid the sillyness of that huge pink armor.

However, I've trained Amelia many times and i can tell you she CAN max out strenght, skill and even defense as a general. Her growth rates are 40/40/30 respectively, so she can do it with the 47 level ups and 2 class changes that she gets. The class changes to knight and general both give her more strenght and defense, the two stats where she needs the most help.

Paladin : She will be your best paladin, but the caps don't do justice to her potential.

Great Knight : OK, but that makes her vulnerable to both armor-piercing and horse-killing weapons, the stat caps and promotion gains aren't as interesting as for a general, and the GK animation sucks... even the criticals.

General : Best caps, all melee weapons, best constitution, best promotion gains and a skill. For the record, the great shield skill activates 20% of the time for a level 20 general (equal to the unit's level). It seems much lower for Amelia because she dodges very often.

Super Recruit : Fun choice, but go for it only if you got seriously screwed in str and def and got great sp and sk as a recruit, cuz you'll get swordmaster stat caps (+1 in str). Body ring(s) required.

Personal experience means nothing. I had a Knoll with 20 defense once, but that doesn't mean that he'll always reach it, does it?

I agree that Paladin caps are inferior.

As for Great Knight, DON'T EVEN THINK about using Armorslayers/Horseslayer weapons as an argument. Amelia has such insane SPD and Luck (coupled with Supports), the likelihood that she runs into one of those weapons AND she gets hit is unreasonably low.
And animations? Please. That's not an argument at all.
I'm pretty sure most serious players turn animation off.

Super Recruit just sucks. It's interesting for its +15% crit. as a LANCE class, but that's about it.